THE IMPORTANCE OF LOCAL POLITICS
Lately, this topic has been a burr under my saddle.
Independents and Democrats (and even moderate Republicans) don't seem to be very interested in local politics anymore. These are the same folks who will take the time to sort their garbage for recyclables, and to compost their grass clippings. But they can't be bothered with paying attention to their local political situation. They'll get out and pound pavement for their presidential candidate, but won't lift a finger to get their Mayor elected. Or their school board representative. Or their county commisioners, or their state senator/representative. And then they wonder what in the hell is going on when the Kansas legislature attempts to slide back into the dark ages. I'm as guilty as everyone else over this. As soon as the Presidential election was over, I took a vacation from politics. Haven't been to a meeting, barely even wrote anything on Facebook, let alone here on LJ.
Right wing Republicans, on the other hand, seem to take it as their God-given duty to help run their local politics. They vote. They donate time and money. They attend meetings. They campaign. They run for office. No wonder all the local elections have gone heavily towards the Republican side of the fence. And not the good side of the Republican fence, either, but the side that believes that they are doing politics for the Glory of God. We need to stop this.
The people who start out as our City commissioners, our mayors, all those offices I listed up above, are the same people who end up being our US Senators and Representatives in the next decade or two. I don't think I want someone who believes I should be prevented from having an abortion, getting a divorce, getting the morning-after pill, or doing ANY DAMN THING I WANT TO LEGALLY DO representing me in Congress. And yes, I know that description hits VERY close to home for nearly every Kansas National congresscritter right now. They may not come right out and say it, but their voting record speaks for itself.
The thought is terrifyingly close to Gilead.
We need to get involved. We have to get a (for lack of a better term) base of sensible center and center-left representatives built back up in our local governments, so we have people that have political experience ready to move up the ladder from city, to state, to national levels. And we don't have that any more.
If you are a Democrat (heck, even if you aren't-they welcome independents at their meetings), contact your state Democratic Committee and find out who your reps are in your area. Go to the local meetings. Get involved in your city government. Get involved in your school board government. GET INVOLVED. If you have the time to invest, run for local office. It takes very little time to be a local Democrat committee person, and yet there are two positions for every voting precinct in the state-one man and one woman.
Autonomy is the price of sloth, and we are very close to finding that out the hard way. What would have taken just a bit of effort a decade or two ago, now will take some serious work. But unless we want to go back to the days that the right wing dreams of, where women couldn't get out of an unwanted pregnancy, or an unwanted marriage, or an unwanted life choice, we are going to have to get our collective butts in gear.
Independents and Democrats (and even moderate Republicans) don't seem to be very interested in local politics anymore. These are the same folks who will take the time to sort their garbage for recyclables, and to compost their grass clippings. But they can't be bothered with paying attention to their local political situation. They'll get out and pound pavement for their presidential candidate, but won't lift a finger to get their Mayor elected. Or their school board representative. Or their county commisioners, or their state senator/representative. And then they wonder what in the hell is going on when the Kansas legislature attempts to slide back into the dark ages. I'm as guilty as everyone else over this. As soon as the Presidential election was over, I took a vacation from politics. Haven't been to a meeting, barely even wrote anything on Facebook, let alone here on LJ.
Right wing Republicans, on the other hand, seem to take it as their God-given duty to help run their local politics. They vote. They donate time and money. They attend meetings. They campaign. They run for office. No wonder all the local elections have gone heavily towards the Republican side of the fence. And not the good side of the Republican fence, either, but the side that believes that they are doing politics for the Glory of God. We need to stop this.
The people who start out as our City commissioners, our mayors, all those offices I listed up above, are the same people who end up being our US Senators and Representatives in the next decade or two. I don't think I want someone who believes I should be prevented from having an abortion, getting a divorce, getting the morning-after pill, or doing ANY DAMN THING I WANT TO LEGALLY DO representing me in Congress. And yes, I know that description hits VERY close to home for nearly every Kansas National congresscritter right now. They may not come right out and say it, but their voting record speaks for itself.
The thought is terrifyingly close to Gilead.
We need to get involved. We have to get a (for lack of a better term) base of sensible center and center-left representatives built back up in our local governments, so we have people that have political experience ready to move up the ladder from city, to state, to national levels. And we don't have that any more.
If you are a Democrat (heck, even if you aren't-they welcome independents at their meetings), contact your state Democratic Committee and find out who your reps are in your area. Go to the local meetings. Get involved in your city government. Get involved in your school board government. GET INVOLVED. If you have the time to invest, run for local office. It takes very little time to be a local Democrat committee person, and yet there are two positions for every voting precinct in the state-one man and one woman.
Autonomy is the price of sloth, and we are very close to finding that out the hard way. What would have taken just a bit of effort a decade or two ago, now will take some serious work. But unless we want to go back to the days that the right wing dreams of, where women couldn't get out of an unwanted pregnancy, or an unwanted marriage, or an unwanted life choice, we are going to have to get our collective butts in gear.